In today's Witness I am talking about two times in my life when God opened doors for me and how He was in all the little details of how it all worked out. I then talk about one time God closed a door and how even though I was upset, I now see it was so I could have this life I was meant to have! Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
We have all seen God working in our lives, however, we might not all be aware it is God who is working in our lives. This is why it is so important we start talking about it more. The more we share our experiences the more people understand how God works and how much He truly loves us. If you would be willing to share any experience you have had of how God has worked or is working your life, please email me at catherine@findingtruenorthcoaching.com or just click here. It won’t take up much of your time and your story could be just the story that someone needs to hear today. Prayerfully consider sharing. Everyone has a story and the world needs to hear them. I look forward to spending time with you again tomorrow and I will have another witness for you next Wednesday. Remember Jesus loves you and so do I. Have a blessed day!
Open Doors
I was talking with God this morning about what I should witness about today and I felt like He said open doors. He reminded me on the time leading up to our wedding. Tony was in the Air Force and he was assigned at Fairchild AFB near Spokane, WA. He was coming home a few days before the wedding and then we were going to drive cross country for our honeymoon. We were getting married at his parent’s church in Hartford and then our reception was going to be at a VFW not too far from there. Tony’s parents had bought land and built a house in Pomfret, CT, which is only 10 minutes or so from my parents house. I went to visit them often before the wedding. One night was I going over for dinner and they had very serious looks on their faces. I could tell something was wrong. They told me I should have a seat. I thought they were going to tell me something had happened to Tony. Luckily, Tony was fine. Instead they told me that the roof had blown off of the VFW during the last storm we had and it wouldn’t be repaired in time for our wedding. I believe this was the beginning of June and our wedding was July 1st. I had no idea what we were going to do. I called Tony to let him know and also because he is a great problem solver. He talked to his dad and between the two of them they had a new place picked out that night. His dad played cards at the Polish American Club in Newington and they didn't have anything planned for that day so they said we could use it. It was amazing how quickly God opened all of those doors. It turned out it was actually a much better place to have the reception because it had air conditioning and the other place did not. It was so hot that day that the cake frosting was melting on the way to decorate the reception hall and we got there around 8 A. M.
The next memory God brought to mind about opening doors was my Master’s Degree program. I had gotten my bachelor’s degree in psychology because in CT you couldn’t get a degree in education, you had to get a different degree and then be accepted into the education program there. That would have been an extra year of schooling and I didn’t get accepted. Which again was a blessing because Tony and I would have been separated that whole year since he was already in Washington at his new job. It is amazing how God works in all these little details. Sometimes we feel awful or we feel sad or angry that something didn’t work out and then we find out later the reason it didn’t work out and it all makes sense.
Since I didn’t get into the education program while getting my undergraduate degree I started to look at Master’s Degree programs near where we lived. I found a program in Special Education that was a one year accelerated program. That meant you went to school five quarters, summer, fall, winter, spring, summer and then you got your Master’s Degree of Education in Special Education. This program only accepted 10 students at a time as it was a couple that ran the program and they couldn’t oversea too many people’s thesis’. It’s funny again, looking back how God is in the details. This was a one year accelerated program, but what we didn’t know at the time, but God did, was that Tony was going to get orders to move in the spring and that if it had been a traditional 2 year program I wouldn’t have been able to finish it, or I would have had to stay in WA for a year while my husband was in Turkey. Wow, I am just realizing how crazy it is that it worked out like that.
That timing isn’t even the thing about the program I was planning to witness about. It was just revealed to me as I was typing. Another extraordinary thing that happened with my program is that I got a call about a week before school was going to start. It was from one of the two advisors for this program. She said she noticed my undergraduate degree was in psychology and was wondering if I wanted to intern for her and her husband while I was in the program. She said it would just be 10-20 hours a week and it would be gather data for them and doing research reviews. For instance if they were doing a study the other girl and I would go to the library and research all the articles that pertained to the topic. We would look through them and give my advisors any that were good and talked about exactly what they needed. We also went to some schools and evaluated their direct interaction classes they had going on. She said if I wanted to do this, they would pay for my tuition and give me a weekly stipend. I was so surprised! She wanted to pay for me to get my Master’s Degree and then also pay me a paycheck each week. God is so good!
One last witness for today as to how much smarter God is than we are was how He helped me select a college. I knew I wanted to be a teacher and I knew Eastern Connecticut State University had a great education program. However, the boy I was dating in High School was going to Seton Hall University in New Jersey, so naturally I wanted to follow him to New Jersey. I applied to two schools in New Jersey and I got accepted to both of them. I even received a large financial aid package as my parents still have 4 kids living at home and one other one in college already. Even though I got a large financial aid package, the school was out of state so it would have been $20,000 a year, which today probably seems like nothing. I had received $14,000 in financial aid with pell grants and work study. This would mean I would need to pay $6,000. That might not seem like a lot, especially with how expensive schools are right now, but there was no way I or my parents could pay $6,000. My guidance counselor at school said I had received a $2,000 scholarship that would help with some of that $6,000. But still I didn’t have the $4,000. I was disappointed but then I got the financial aid packet from ECSU and I would not have to pay anything out of pocket, I would just need to take the standard subsidized loans each year. I was able to get my undergraduate degree with only having about ten to fifteen thousand total in student loans and as I mentioned above my Master’s degree was free. God is so good.
Another reason this is a witness to how God’s ways are higher than our ways is because my high school boyfriend and I broke up. We were together for four years so of course at that age you think you will get married. However, God knew what He had planned for me. My roommate at ECSU was in ROTC and they had bring a friend night. This is where i met Tony. If I had gone to school in New Jersey I might not have met him. Although with his parents moving close to my parents I am sure if I had messed up God’s plan and gone to New Jersey than He would have found another way for us to meet. He is that good. There is no messing up God’s plan, there is just delaying it.
Well, I really enjoyed walking down memory lane with you this morning. I keep thinking I will run out of things to witness about and God keeps showing me new ways that He was there and I didn’t realize it at the time. He is so good like that! God is in the details of your life too. There is a reason you didn’t get that job or that relationship didn’t work out. There is a reason your plan didn’t work out. God’s ways are higher than our ways. He knows so much more than we do and He can look into the future and help us make decisions today that set us up for a better tomorrow. My challenge to you today is to think back to a time where you were disappointed with how something turned out and then try and see if you can see why it happened. Does it make more sense now with the benefit of hindsight? I hope you all have an amazing week!